An article by Silvana Harte
Suddenly Brazil explodes with people on the streets of the cities and demands for the Health Minister to go. The crisis of Bolonsaro’s regime runs deep as suddenly the astronomic Covid figures of infection and death rise and register a political impact from the towns to the countryside.
There’s a long history to the collapsing health system; the hospitals were never prepared and funded and vaccines are not available. Dr Achal Prabhala, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, sums up the contradictory points: ” What is happening in Brazil is the most horrendous situation possible. They have long delayed making an intervention and they have resisted vaccines. The president has been incredibly harmful in everything he says.
“It’s an unbelievable mess in which infection rates are skyrocketing and deaths are rising. Brazil is by far the country which has handled the pandemic the worst and really needs to be called out.
“Bolsonaro supported the US and a handful of rich countries in refusing to allow patents to be used by developing countries. But now he’s begging India to give him a few million vaccines. Brazil has been very bad situation; Bolsonaro has joined a handful of the rich countries which were opposing the deregulation proposed by India and SA at the World Trade Organization.”
“Despite not supporting India, Bolsonaro is now appealing the prime minister of India to say his supply of vaccines have not kicked in yet and he needs a couple of million vaccines.
While Bolsonaro has done poorly internationally, on a national scale things are disastrous. Nationally Brazil needs to get to understanding and create a general committee to deal with coronavirus. However, since the beginning of the pandemic, the Bolsonaro government has not tried to talk to any of the governors so that everyone could solve the fight against the pandemic in an organized way.
Waging war on the states
“There is a battle between the state of São Paulo and the federal system based in Brasilia which is the one using the Sinovac.
“Meanwhile the centre west is trying to airlift vaccines in India to the smaller states in the north and make deals with Russia” he said recently on the BBC.
Anticipating the chaos, the governors of the Northeast, the state of São Paulo (Southeast), Rio Grande do Norte (Northern Region) and São Paulo (Southern Region) organized and decided to create a committee to deal jointly and take care of all issues related to coronavirus. Thus, the Scientific Committee was formed in the Northeast region.
The Scientific Committee of the Northeast covers the states of Alagoras, Bahia, Ceará, Maranhão, Paraíba, Pernambuco, Piauí, and Sergipe. The states of Rio Grande do Norte e São Paulo do not belong to Northeast Regions. However, for different reasons they belong to the committee: the Rio Grande do Norte (Northern Region) its governor is a member of the Worker’s Party (PT) and the state of São Paulo state is said to be the richest state of the federation and could not stay out the deal.
We also, cannot forget it has a biologic research centre that produces different types of vaccines including for the Covid-19. coronavirus. This was necessary due to the childish behavior of president Bolsonaro.
| “There’s an atmosphere of disgust, abandonment, despair and impunity,” said one staff member at the Alvorada health clinic in Manaus, where medics were filmed pleading for divine intervention. “What we’re watching is a complete massacre, a desperate situation, a horror film,” article in The Guardian. |
The governors imposed for a time a local lockdown. But President Bolsonaro sabotaged all the efforts of governors, including, accusing them to be harming the economy creating more unemployment. Finally, he refused to pass money on to the states forcing them to reopen the trade, because with the trade closed the governors and the only governor, they would not have taxes levied from the firms, since they would be closed. As a result, they would not have any money to pay for public servants.
President Bolsonaro since the beginning of the pandemic treated it as if it were a “gripizinha” as if “nothing would happen to him”. The lives of Brazilians are unstuck and he has made no pretence of taking care of his people.
The Scientific Committee of the Northeast met online under the coordination of scientist Miguel Nicolelis and Sergio Resende to address measures to cope with the pandemic. First, preventive measures were created to avoid the contagion of the virus as social distancing, use of masks, use of continuous gel and wash hands whenever possible. Staying at home would be ideal but often it is difficult because many people live in a room with several family members making it impossible to keep a distance.
According to the Northeast Committee, on April 3, 2020, they proposed several measures to follow up the work to guide and articulate actions of states and municipalities in the fight to the pandemic to locate the outbreaks of the pandemic, based on scientific knowledge. Reaffirmed the importance of social distancing and restrictive measures that are more efficient to combat the pandemic, subcommittees (under the guidance of the Scientific Committee) were created with the intention of inviting national and international scientists to help combat the pandemic, to make a report to clarify the effectiveness of the use of homemade masks produced by various types of fabric, monitoring of Covid-19 and an international support network.
Finally, in the face of the confusion created in the vaccine makes the Scientific Committee urge for the Northeast Consortium to renew and expand prevention measures and propose to governors throughout the country the creation of a “National Commission of Independent Vaccination” such is the irresponsibility of the federal government.
In short nothing is working and the people are desperate. Bolsonaro out and national planning for vaccination in!